Introduction

Introduction

Something appears to be wrong with the world. There are things that should be here and others that shouldn’t. Everyone knows what these things are.

More kindness, less hatred.

More liberty, less oppression.

More honor, less lying.

More compassion and understanding, less greed and killing.

However we count them, they all boil down to more love and less fear. These inner qualities cause or prevent outer things from happening. The results of our choices make us more or less human. The aggregate of our choices define the world we find ourselves in, so we might say that these inner qualities and the outer things they produce are the same things.

We long for the things that don’t exist for us. So much, that some of us will do anything in our power to get them, regardless of the cost to others or indeed to ourselves. This is often stated as an “enough.”

Enough food.

Enough time.

Enough attention.

Enough money.

Enough power.

Or-- which is really the same thing--we will do anything in our power to get rid of what we fear: loneliness, powerlessness, death.

But if the things we desire really didn’t exist, how could we know enough about them to know we wanted them? Love exists, even though we don’t feel we have enough ourselves. The same for food, shelter and money. All the rest, even time. Others have these things; we don’t. We think if we had all these things ourselves our fears would melt away, and sometimes this is true.

Our fear of death

Except for the fear of death. Because no matter how much our longings are satisfied, Death plays the last card and it’s always an ace. But what Death knows—and we no longer remember, hardly anyone does—is that there is a Joker in the deck somewhere, which if we knew about it, and if we had some way to obtain it, would change the game. Death still plays his card and we still die, but the game might not be completely over, as we might have moved on to another table before that last trump fell.

Isn’t thinking anyone could cheat Death foolish? Yes, of course it is, unless we have become a certain kind of Fool—just that certain kind portrayed on the Joker itself.

In the long history of mankind this type of knowledge was not always as unknown as it is today. We are going to look at why this is so, at what series of events occurred to suppress it, but only to convince ourselves that there once was such knowledge--carefully hidden of necessity--and that it is still available to the Fool who goes searching for it. Our main task, however, will be to discover what that knowledge is by examining and decoding an extraordinary map of a journey that can be taken to obtain it and then understand it, for without this latter the knowledge is useless.

Taking the journey beyond the fear

We take this as the definition of our Fool:

One who seeks, practices and then understands certain knowledge which will transform him or her into the realm of love, beyond all fear, and beyond death.

This is the Fool’s Journey, and it indeed seems foolish to those who don’t believe that such a journey even exists, or who are afraid or unwilling to take it. But by bringing the nature of it out in the open a few more of us may be emboldened to dare the journey ourselves.

The cost, however, is high: it is nearly everything we are. The danger is also high; part of the knowledge entails becoming skilled enough to survive and master the journey to the end. But the rewards are higher still, and make it, for some, the only journey worth taking.

Going to war

They become warrior-fools in that they go to war against the parts of themselves they wish to conquer, so that other parts may be birthed. Those who complete the journey are called herein The Few, for few have even started the journey. Some who do, fail. Others don’t finish in one lifetime. But enough have succeeded to assist the Fool to become one of them. Most importantly, this journey is more accessible than it has been at any time in the last two thousand years, and more help is available to those who embark on it.

Finding out for yourself

At least we should know that such a journey is possible. We should know that destinations beyond the space and time of consensus reality exist. We should know that is possible to reach them and join those that have gone before us. Then we will have enough ammunition to defend ourselves against the entire rest of the world which says it is all make-believe nonsense and dreaming.

Wishful thinking.

Foolishness.

But foolishness is the business of those who only appear to be fools to those around them. This appearance is just part of the price of the journey.